Improvement in dummy or traction engines



, ing had to the accompanying drawing and to spective view of the expansionchamber with UNITED EN'I QFFIGE.

ARETUS A. WILDER, OF DETROIT, MICHIGAN, ASSIGNOR OF ONE'HALF HIS RIGHT TO ARTHUR RANKIN, OF WINDSOR, ONTARIO.

IMPROVEMENT IN DUMMY OR TRACTION ENGINES.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 136,886, dated March 18, 1873. I

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ARETUS A. WILDER, of Detroit, in the county of Wayne and State of Michigan, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Dummy or Traction Engines; and I do declare that the following is a true and accurate description thereof, reference bethe letters of reference marked thereon and being a part of this specification, in which- Figure 1, Sheet 1, shows in elevation the boiler and vengines and a portion of the carbed or platform of the ,dummy car on which they rest. Fig. 2 is a longitudinal verticalv section of the same. Fig. 3, Sheet 2, is a bor wizontal section, showing, in plan, all below the plane as w in Fig. 2; and Fig. 4 is a pera portion of one wall broken away to show the interior thereof.

Like letters refer to like parts in the several figures.

The nature of my invention relates to the application of steam as a motor to tractionengines and that class of railway carriages which are operated on tram-ways, are self propelling, and which are also used to draw other carriages on said tram-ways, which car riages are not provided with motive power, the said self-propelling carriages beingknown as dummy-cars and steam-dummies. Heretofore great objections have been made to the introduction of this class of vehicles on the tram-ways of townsand cities, and also to the employment oftraction-engines or roadsteamers on account of the smoke thrown off by them and the sight and noise of the exhaust steam, which would frighten draft-animals, causing danger to life and limb, and were otherwise objectionable, which I obviate in the application of my invention; which consists in superheating the exhaust steam to convert it into hydrogen gas, which issues from the car unseen and noiselessly. I To this end I employ a chamber in which the exhaust steam is expanded, a part of it naturally con (lensing therein while the remainder passes through a superheating-coil in the fire-box of the boiler, for the purpose hereinbefore stated.

In the drawing, A represents a portion of the floor, bed, or platform of one of the aforesaid dummy-cars with the housing or inclosure removed, on which is erected a boiler, B, of the vertical multitubular variety, which supplies steam to the engines 0 O, by means of which the car is propelled through any suitable system or train of gearing. Between the engines and the boiler is placed a steamtight chamber, D, transversely across the car, which chamber may be quadrangular in form, or otherwise. In the upper part of this chamber are two deflectors, a a, inclined from the upper ends toward the center of the chamber. Into this chamber the exhaust steam from the cylinders enters through the pipes 12 b. The steam blown from the cylinders through the cylindercocks enters through the tubes 0 c, and that blown from the boiler through the safety-valve enters through a pipe, d, and any water of condensation is conducted to the lower part of, the saidchamber, where it is drawn off through a drip-pipe, e, which should be trapped to prevent the es cape of steam. The exhaust steam expands in the said chamber from which it issues through the pipes ff at the upper part of theends under the deflectors, which pipes enter the firebox of the boiler just below the crown-sheet, where they form a flat coil of three members, the center of the middle one having a T inserted, from which a branch, 9, is carried up through a central tube of the boiler, specially made longer than the others for that purpose, and terminates in the smokebox above the upper tube-sheet, whence the h ydrogen gas (for such the exhaust steam has now become) flows quietly and invisibly in a) continuous stream into the atmosphere, at the same time acting in a manner similar toax steam-jet to urge the draft and the progress of the combustion of the fuel in the firebox. If the exhaust steam flowing through the highly-heated coil have an atom of its oxygen abstracted from it by the heated metal, as it necessarily must, then the remaining volume of watery vapor is converted into hydrogen gas, which is invisible, and is absorbed by the external atmosphere.

In time the coil will be oxidized to such an extent that it will require removal, which can be done at a small outlay; but, if care be taken to not raise the temperature too high by to secure by Letters Patent, is

1. The combination of chamber D, arranged to receive exhaust steam, as described, with the coil F located within the fire-box, as described.

2. The construction and arrangement, with relation to the boiler and engine of a dummy car, of the chamber D, deflectors a a, exhaust pipes b b, drip-pipe e, the coils f f, and escapepipe g, as and for the purpose set forth.

ABETUS A. WILDER.

Witnesses H. S. SPRAG-UE, H. F. EBERTS. 

